Park rangers and science-public expertise: science as care in biosecurity for Kauri trees in Aotearoa/New Zealand

McEntee, Marie, Medvecky, Fabien, MacBride-Stewart, Sara ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1562-9536, Macknight, Vicki and Martin, Michael 2023. Park rangers and science-public expertise: science as care in biosecurity for Kauri trees in Aotearoa/New Zealand. Minerva 61 (1) , pp. 117-140. 10.1007/s11024-022-09482-9

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Abstract

Park rangers hold a unique set of knowledge—of science, of publics, of institutional structures, of place, and of self—that should be recognised as valuable. For too long, models of the knowledge of scientists and publics have set people like rangers in an inbetweener position, seeing them as good at communicating, translating or negotiating from one side to the other, but not as making knowledge that is powerful in its own right. In this paper we argue that focus groups with park rangers across regional and conservation parks in Aotearoa/New Zealand reveal the complexity and multiplicity of rangers’ knowledge-making that shows the science-public model as incomplete. We argue further that the model is flawed for its focus on the making and holding of knowledge and not also on how it is enacted. Rangers, we argue, are responsible every day for making knowledgeable decisions for the health and well-being of parks and people. Making good decisions, though, requires not just knowledge but also care. An understanding of the many ways rangers know and enact their knowledge is important for biosecurity practice, especially in models of adaptive governance.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Published Online
Status:	Published
Schools:	Social Sciences (Includes Criminology and Education)
Additional Information:	License information from Publisher: LICENSE 1: URL: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/, Type: open-access
Publisher:	Springer
ISSN:	0026-4695
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	13 February 2023
Date of Acceptance:	30 November 2022
Last Modified:	05 May 2023 20:57
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/156904

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